With a salamander.
Not a lizard– even from the window, Arthur Stuart could see there were no scales. Besides, you didn't have to be some kind of genius to know a salamander from a lizard at five paces. Arthur Stuart was a boy, and boys tended to know such things. Moreover, Arthur Stuart had been an unusually solitary and inquisitive boy, and he had a way with animals, so even if some other boy might make a mistake, Arthur Stuart never would. It was a salamander.
Vilate would say something, and then sip her tea, glancing up from the cup now and then to nod or murmur something. “Mm-hm”; “I know”; “Isn't it just awful?” –as if the salamander was saying something.
But the salamander didn't say nothing. Didn't even look at her, most of the time, though truth to tell you never quite knew for sure what a salamander was looking at, because if one eye was looking there, the other might be looking here, and how would you know? Still and all, Arthur was pretty sure it looked right at him. Knew he was there. But didn't seem to get alarmed or nothing, so Arthur just kept on looking and listening.
“A man shouldn't trifle with a lady's affections,” she was saying. “Once a man goes down that road, the lady has a right to protect herself as best she can.” Another sip. Another nod. “Oh, I know. And the worst of it is, people are going to think so badly of me. But everyone knows that Alvin Smith has hidden powers. Of course I couldn't help myself.”
Another sip. And then, abruptly, tears streamed out of her eyes.
“Oh, my dear, dear soul, my friend, my beloved trusted friend, how can I do this? I really do care for the boy. I really do care for him. Why oh why couldn't he have loved me? Why did he have to spurn me and make me do this?”
And so it went. Arthur wasn't no dummy. He knew right off that Vilate Franker was planning some kind of devilment against Alvin, and he sort of hoped she might mention what it was, though that wasn't too likely, since all she talked about was how bad she felt and how she hated to do it but it was a lady's right to defend her honor even though it might involve giving the appearance of having no honor but that's why it was so good having such a good, true, wonderful friend.
Ah, the tears that flowed. Ah, the sighs. Ah, the quart of tea she consumed while Arthur leaned on the sill, watching, listening.
Oddly, though, as soon as the tears were done, her face just went clean. Not a streak. Not a trace of redness around the eyes. Not a sign that she had even shed a tear.
The tea eventually took its toll. Vilate slid her chair back and rose to her feet. Arthur knew where the privy was; he immediately jumped from the rain barrel and ran around the front of the house before the door even opened leading out to the back. Then, knowing she couldn't possibly hear the bell, he opened the post office door, went inside, clambered over the counter, and made his way into the kitchen from the front of the house. There was the salamander, licking a bit of tea that had spilled from the saucer. As Arthur entered, the salamander lifted its head. Then it scurried back and forth, making a shape on the table. One triangle. Another triangle crossing it.
A hex.
Arthur moved to the chair where Vilate had been sitting. Standing, his head was just about at the height her head was at when she was seated. And as he leaned over her chair, the salamander changed.
No, not really. No, the salamander disappeared. Instead, a woman was sitting in the chair across from him.
“You're an evil little boy,” the woman said with a sad smile.
Arthur hardly even noticed what she said. Because he knew her. It was Old Peg Guester. The woman he called Mother. The woman who was buried under a certain stone marker on the hill behind the roadhouse, near his real mother, the runaway slave girl he never met. Old Peg was there.
But it wasn't Old Peg. It was the salamander.
“And you imagine things, you nasty boy. You make up stories.”
Old Peg used to call him her “nasty boy,” but it was a tease. It was when he repeated something someone else had said. She would laugh and call him nasty boy and give him a hug and tell him not to repeat that remark to anyone.
But this woman, this pretend Old Peg, she meant it. She thought he was a nasty boy.
He moved away from the chair. The salamander was back on the table and Old Peg was gone. Arthur knelt by the table to look at the salamander at eye level. It stared into his eyes. Arthur stared back.
He used to do this for hours with animals in the forest. When he was very little, he understood them. He came away with their story in his mind. Gradually that ability faded. Now he caught only glimmers. But then, he didn't spend as much time with animals anymore. Maybe if he tried hard enough…
“Don't forget me, salamander,” he whispered. “I want to know your story. I want to know who taught you how to make them hexes on the table.”
He reached out a hand, then slowly let a single finger come to rest on the salamander's head. It didn't recoil from him; it didn't move even when his finger made contact. It just looked at him.
“What are you doing indoors?” he whispered. “You don't like it indo ors. You want to be outside. Near the water. In the mud. In the leaves. With bugs.”
It was the kind of thing Alvin did, murmuring to animals, suggesting things to them.
“I can take you back to the mud if you want. Come with me, if you want. Come with me, if you can.”
The salamander raised a foreleg, then slowly set it down. One step closer to Arthur.
And from the salamander he thought he felt a hunger, a desire for food, but more than that, a desire for… for freedom. The salamander didn't like being a prisoner.
The door opened.
“Why, Arthur Stuart,” said Vilate. “Imagine you coming to visit.”
Arthur had sense enough not to jump to his feet as if he was doing something wrong. “Any letters for Alvin?” he asked.
“Not a one.”
Arthur didn't even mention the salamander, which was just as well, because Vilate never even looked at it. You'd think that if a lady was caught with a live salamander– or even a dead one, for that matter– on her kitchen table, she'd at least offer some explanation.
“Want some tea?” she asked.
“Can't stay,” said Arthur.
“Oh, next time then. Give Alvin my love.” Her smile was sweet and beautiful.
Arthur reached out his hand, right in front of her, and touched the salamander's back.
She didn't notice. Or at least she gave no sign of noticing.
He moved away, backed out of the room, hopped the counter, and ran out the front door, hearing the bell ring behind him as he went.
If the salamander was a prisoner, who had captured it? Not Vilate– the salamander was making hexes to fool her into seeing somebody there. Though Arthur was willing to bet that it wasn't Old Peg Guester that Vilate saw. But the salamander wasn't fooling her out of its own free will, because all it wanted was to be free to go back to being an ordinary salamander again.
He'd have to tell Alvin about this, that was sure. Vilate was planning to do something rotten to him, and the salamander that walked out hexes on the kitchen table, it had something to do with the plot.
How could Vilate be so stupid that she didn't even see me touching her salamander? Why didn't she get upset when she saw me in the kitchen when she got back from the privy?
Maybe she wanted me to see the salamander. Or maybe someone else wanted me to see it.
Wanted me to see Mother.
For a moment, walking along the dusty main street of Hatrack River, he lost control of himself, almost let himself cry thinking about Mother, thinking about seeing her sitting across from him. It wasn't real, he told himself. It was all fakery. Humbug. Hoaxification. Whoever was behind all this was a liar, and a mean liar at that. Nasty boy indeed. Evil boy. He wasn't no evil boy. He was a good boy and the real Peg Guester would know that, she wouldn't say nothing like that to him. The real Peg Guester would hug him up tight and say, “My good boy, Arthur Stuart, you are my own good boy.”